Fettlin' and Mendin' do you?

[Padge]

Inspired by The Repair Shop, are you a fettler and mender.

I used to enjoy repairing old electronic bits and pieces but these days I have lapsed, watching The Repair Shop makes me think I should get my hand in again

[Futtocks]

2 minutes ago, Padge said:

Inspired by The Repair Shop, are you a fettler and mender.

I used to enjoy repairing old electronic bits and pieces but these days I have lapsed, watching The Repair Shop makes me think I should get my hand in again

There's some interesting stuff about the rebirth of repair culture in this series: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000vgh9/episodes/player

My mum helped set up a monthly repair club in her town a few years ago, and it was going fine before lockdown. I think it is affiliated with https://www.repaircafe.org/en/ but I can't remember of that's the case or not. Anyway, repair and re-use (where practically possible) is better than recycling.

[GUBRATS]

It's truly depressing to see the stuff thrown away at the local recycling centre ' Tip ' , all because people are too lazy to fix the damn things 

[Futtocks]

1 minute ago, GUBRATS said:

It's truly depressing to see the stuff thrown away at the local recycling centre ' Tip ' , all because people are too lazy to fix the damn things 

And because the manufacturers make things less and less fixable every year too, let's not forget.

[The Hallucinating Goose]

I've done a lot of DIY and mending around the house this last year or so. I built a breakfast bar, assembled two sheds, built a fence, put up some shelves, designed and built a bookcase from scratch, mended a couple of old garden benches by replacing all the slats and painting them a nice British racing green, replaced some broken glass in the greenhouse with plastic. I'm sure there's some other stuff I'm forgetting as well.

Latest thing was the element blowing in the cooker. The family were immediately online looking at prices of new cookers, I just ordered the new part, watched a couple of videos on YouTube as to how to mend it and fixed it up fine, £250 or so for a new cooker, £30 for a new part, absolutely no need to even think about getting a whole new appliance! 

[Padge]

17 minutes ago, Futtocks said:

And because the manufacturers make things less and less fixable every year too, let's not forget.

Built in obsolescence is a curse. Anything sold with a "long" warranty is almost guaranteed to fail within months of the warranty running out.

 

[Padge]

1 minute ago, The Hallucinating Goose said:

I've done a lot of DIY and mending around the house this last year or so. I built a breakfast bar, assembled two sheds, built a fence, put up some shelves, designed and built a bookcase from scratch, mended a couple of old garden benches by replacing all the slats and painting them a nice British racing green, replaced some broken glass in the greenhouse with plastic. I'm sure there's some other stuff I'm forgetting as well.

Latest thing was the element blowing in the cooker. The family were immediately online looking at prices of new cookers, I just ordered the new part, watched a couple of videos on YouTube as to how to mend it and fixed it up fine, £250 or so for a new cooker, £30 for a new part, absolutely no need to even think about getting a whole new appliance! 

Our dishwasher was playing up, not draining, quick check on You Tube and soon found out how to dismantle the offending parts and cleared it. Sorted out with no cost but my time.

[The Hallucinating Goose]

7 hours ago, Padge said:

Built in obsolescence is a curse. Anything sold with a "long" warranty is almost guaranteed to fail within months of the warranty running out.

 

Funnily enough we'd had the oven I mentioned for just over 3 years when the element packed in. The warranty for it was 3 years. 

[Bearman]

I fancy myself as a bit of a bodger. By that I mean the jobs tend to be a bit messy. That doesn't stop me though. For instance, my shed is my tool station and my gym. All my tools are in racks but all of my racks and shelves are a bit skew whiff. I have 6 spirit levels on their station but none of them seem to work.

It's my gym because I use my exercise bike in there every day. As I peddle I often think of rearranging something or an idea for another bodger I can do. I reason that if I I make it for nothing or little money it doesn't matter as I am the only one who can see it. My next project is to make a wooden cross trainer ( courtesy of youtube).

I am also making plastic blocks from HDPE 2 ( milk bottle and yoghurt pot etc plastic). I melt it into a non stick loaf tin with blow torch and then use the blocks for more bodging. 

I would appreciate any ideas on projects that I could undertake with only using hand tools. 

[Marauder]

11 hours ago, GUBRATS said:

It's truly depressing to see the stuff thrown away at the local recycling centre ' Tip ' , all because people are too lazy to fix the damn things 

Try getting the parts to fix them.

[JohnM]

On its way to me now is a trigger to replace the one that just failed on my 20 year old Husquvarna petrol chainsaw. Cost? £8. Cost of new chainsaw of same spec? £400.

Replaced failed oven element this year for £30. Cost of new equivalent oven £300.

YouTube is your friend, as are numerous spares suplliers such as Ransomes. 

[Futtocks]

3 hours ago, JohnM said:

On its way to me now is a trigger to replace the one that just failed on my 20 year old Husquvarna petrol chainsaw. Cost? £8. Cost of new chainsaw of same spec? £400.

Replaced failed oven element this year for £30. Cost of new equivalent oven £300.

YouTube is your friend, as are numerous spares suplliers such as Ransomes. 

A lot of modern tech. is sealed up and almost impossible to access the innards of without either specialist tools or damaging the item.

Try replacing the battery in a modern smartphone when it stops holding a decent charge, and very few models will let you. There is a phone called a Fair Phone which allows piecemeal replacements and upgrades (covered in the Radio 4 doc I linked to earlier) and it is a little depressing that such idea is considered revolutionary.

[voteronniegibbs]

12 hours ago, Bearman said:

I would appreciate any ideas on projects that I could undertake with only using hand tools. 

We have a stretch of driveway down the side of the house, which I am converting into a space for growing veg.

It's an ongoing project of mine to use it for raised beds on a hard surface. I have used a power drill to make this easier when securing timber frames together, but could have used the traditional hand drill. Much of what I am doing uses hand saws and screwdrivers.

[Padge]

13 hours ago, Marauder said:

Try getting the parts to fix them.

A spares shop Wigan can get just about anything

for anything

[Gerrumonside ref]

Great thread!

I fixed my washing machine a long time ago when skint and realised the low cost and skill involved vs the alternative of getting a new one.

Shamefully I don’t own many basic tools, but my perspective changed when on a much lower income than now that maintenance is not only necessary in life but satisfying.

I find now when I can’t maintain something, I want to find someone who can and view the tip as the very last resort for anything.  Plus I would encourage people to think about Freecycle initiatives when getting rid of things like furniture if you can’t find a home for them as your second hand stuff can be a godsend for somebody else.

[Mark S]

On 13/05/2021 at 23:38, Futtocks said:

And because the manufacturers make things less and less fixable every year too, let's not forget.

How many Dysons at the top probably just need a good clean up and new belt? 

[Trojan]

On 14/05/2021 at 00:03, Padge said:

Our dishwasher was playing up, not draining, quick check on You Tube and soon found out how to dismantle the offending parts and cleared it. Sorted out with no cost but my time.

Since we moved to Lincolnshire I'm our dishwasher 

[Gerrumonside ref]

1 minute ago, Trojan said:

Since we moved to Lincolnshire I'm our dishwasher 

A satisfying chore I find.  

[Trojan]

In the mills where I was brought up, the fettler was the bloke who went around the looms cleaning them.

[Padge]

1 hour ago, Trojan said:

Since we moved to Lincolnshire I'm our dishwasher 

Do you need fettlin' and mendin' 

[Exiled Townie]

20 hours ago, Trojan said:

In the mills where I was brought up, the fettler was the bloke who went around the looms cleaning them.

In Cumbrian fettle can mean your condition, as in "How's tha fettle". (How do you feel), or to mend or repair something as in That'll fettle it or  I fettled it. 

And it's even on Cumbrian cards

[Ullman]

On 13/05/2021 at 23:59, The Hallucinating Goose said:

I've done a lot of DIY and mending around the house this last year or so. I built a breakfast bar, assembled two sheds, built a fence, put up some shelves, designed and built a bookcase from scratch, mended a couple of old garden benches by replacing all the slats and painting them a nice British racing green, replaced some broken glass in the greenhouse with plastic. I'm sure there's some other stuff I'm forgetting as well.

Latest thing was the element blowing in the cooker. The family were immediately online looking at prices of new cookers, I just ordered the new part, watched a couple of videos on YouTube as to how to mend it and fixed it up fine, £250 or so for a new cooker, £30 for a new part, absolutely no need to even think about getting a whole new appliance! 

You might already know this but the Hull Library of Stuff is a brilliant resource if you do DIY and you need specialist tools occasionally. Saves you a lot of money compared to hire shops. We needed a mitre saw for some moulding a couple of weeks back. Cost us £4 to borrow one for a week.

[Futtocks]

57 minutes ago, Ullman said:

You might already know this but the Hull Library of Stuff is a brilliant resource if you do DIY and you need specialist tools occasionally. Saves you a lot of money compared to hire shops. We needed a mitre saw for some moulding a couple of weeks back. Cost us £4 to borrow one for a week.

Very interesting idea - I'll mention it to some people I know who are interested in this sort of thing.

[Farmduck]

In Australia fettlers are railway maintenance workers, particularly track maintenance.

[JohnM]

I was brought up with this meaning 

 

VERB

fettling (present participle)

1. trim or clean the rough edges of (a metal casting or a piece of pottery) before firing.

   • NORTHERN ENGLISH
     make or repair (something